


Interlude and Second Date: Waterfront Waffle Cones

by therapychicken



Series: Chatting Up And What Comes After [4]
Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Pre-Canon, Ice Cream Parlors, In which Patrick stumbles into David a few years early, John Green novel references for some reason, M/M, Nervousness, POV Patrick, Patrick needs someone to pull his head out of his ass, Rachel the BFF-slash-ex, Toronto geography is mostly imagined, genuinely i don't know why- it just happened, stamp collecting, still waters run deep, the long awaited second date
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:34:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27083461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/therapychicken/pseuds/therapychicken
Summary: Patrick expresses his anxiousness by doing laundry, making lasagna, and also texting his ex.Then he goes on that ice cream date with David that he's been dreaming about.
Relationships: (past), Patrick Brewer/David Rose, Patrick Brewer/Rachel
Series: Chatting Up And What Comes After [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1560142
Comments: 31
Kudos: 111





	Interlude and Second Date: Waterfront Waffle Cones

On Sunday, at about 11:30 AM, Patrick stood in the middle of his apartment and looked around. He’d done his weekly vacuuming. He’d done laundry, and then he’d done a linen load even though he only had one set of sheets to wash, and then he’d done a towel load for good measure. He’d precut some vegetables for this week’s lunches, a package of ground beef was defrosting in a bowl of warm water on the counter for dinner later, and a vegetarian lasagna to be eaten piecemeal over the course of the week was in the oven. He’d done all his dishes, swept and wiped down the kitchen, and done a thorough scavenger hunt for any of Jessica’s stuff that she’d left in his apartment over the course of their two-month relationship and deposited it all in a cardboard box next to his front door. He’d made a grocery list, noting the approaching expiration date for his bottle of milk, and had been about to defrost the freezer when he’d realized that he was acting like a crazy person. 

So now he stood looking around his spotless apartment, realizing that he no longer had any excuses not to think about last night. 

Could someone have a date that was the best _and_ worst first date of their entire life? If not, could Patrick apply to be the first one? Surely there had to be some kind of trophy, or at least a tee shirt. 

Yesterday, at least, Patrick’s antsiness had been about excitement, jitters, making sure that his one pair of skinny jeans went with _that_ shirt, going to the drugstore and looking for one of the products off the “top ten curly hair products for men” listicle he’d found online, and going through every bit of dating protocol he’d used over the last ten years, since he was a sixteen year old jock taking Rachel to the movies, and trying to figure out if it still applied. Was he the one taking David out because he’s the one who gave his number, and had asked him out tonight? But David had called him, and he’d suggested the restaurant and set the time. Did it make a difference? Who paid? Did Patrick pull out David’s chair for him? Help David into his jacket? (It was August, but still, good to keep these things in mind. Especially given that leather number David had worn to the club..) Did he initiate the kiss that he was so desperately hoping for, if things went well? 

Today, Patrick knew _exactly_ how great that kiss had been, and how awful the feeling before had been when David had seemed to be shutting down on him after what might just have been the best date of Patrick’s entire life, and how absolutely fucking _shitty_ and _helpless_ he’d felt realizing that David was trying to push him away. It would have just felt shitty and not helpless if he’d thought that David actually actively disliked him or had a bad time or whatever, but then he remembered the kiss, and how much fun David had seemed to be having, and how flirty and smooth he was, and how weirdly reluctant he’d seemed even when he’d been coolly describing every single thing that made him out of the reach of someone boring like Patrick. 

And now he had to sit here and wait and hope that David would text him, wonder whether David _should_ text him… This was probably all a bad idea, right, setting himself up to get his heart broken when David didn’t text him back?

He needed to talk to someone, and there was only one person he could even imagine wanting to talk to right now. The problem would be if she would leave him enough time to tell him his problem before murdering him in cold blood. 

He scrolled through his contacts and clicked on her name when he saw it. There was a long chain of texts, the most recent of which had been received when they’d broken up most recently, six months earlier, Rachel saying exasperatedly that she didn’t understand what happened this time but she wouldn’t be waiting for him to come crawling back. 

And yet somehow at the end of her rebound she was the one crawling back to him. 

If there was one thing about Patrick’s past that he could change it would be the moment that he’d asked Rachel out, because before that they’d been friends- they could talk about anything, they’d known each other for years, they had each other’s backs- but after that fateful moment they’d become either boyfriend-girlfriend or exes. Either in a romantic relationship or with no relationship at all. And that _sucked_. As much as he was starting to hate the heteronormativity or whatever that he’d grown up with that stopped him from realizing he was gay all these years (he’d been doing some internet reading and was picking up terminology), he hated whatever dumb social convention had meant that the day that Patrick and Rachel had started dating, he’d lost his best friend. 

Taking a deep breath, he began to type. 

**_Hey Rachel, are you around? I’d love to talk to you, if you are_ **

_You know I’m dating Jason now, right?_

And yes, right, he did know that she was dating Jason, who apparently was one of the guys from her soccer league- one of his friends had mentioned it at a party that he’d taken Jessica to a few weeks earlier. The circle of friends had looked at him when the news came up, as if waiting for him to react, and Jessica had been so uncomfortable. She’d said afterward that it was like they were all waiting for Patrick to dump her, and only a week later, when Patrick had indeed done that, she’d said it was obviously because he was still hung up on Rachel. It almost made Patrick laugh, now, thinking of that little detail, except that the whole rest of it had been so miserable.

**_Yes, I know- it’s not about that. If you’re not able to it’s fine_ **

_I’m really confused, because you haven’t wanted to talk to me for months, but now…_

**_Yeah, it’s complicated. I swear, I’m not trying to get us back together, it’s something else, I just want to talk to you_ **

_About what?_

**_I’m gay_ **

And fuck, Patrick had _not_ meant to type that at all, and he’d definitely not meant to send it. Yet his fingers had been demon-possessed, apparently, and now it was out there, and what the hell was she going to say, she was going to _murder_ him-

His phone buzzed.

_Oh Jesus, Patrick_

_Oh wow_

_I’ll be over in half an hour with a pizza, speak now if you don’t still like peppers and onions_

Well. Maybe he hadn’t lost his best friend that fateful day in eleventh grade, after all. 

With a tremulous smile, he texted back that peppers and onions still sounded great. 

**

“It’s not that I’m not kind of mad and still processing a little… ahhhh!” A piece of cheese that had been dangling out of Rachel’s mouth had made the drop onto her shirt. “Oh fuck.”

She grabbed a napkin from the stack next to the pizza box and used it to pick up the cheese gingerly and put it on the picnic table. Patrick vaguely felt like he should offer to help, but he had no idea how. “Um… can I get you… water? Detergent? I don’t even know.” 

Rachel laughed as she spat on another napkin and dabbed it on her sweater. “Nah, it’s a tiny stain, nobody will notice it even if it doesn’t come out. Anyway. I’ll probably wake up in the middle of the night tonight and realize that I wasted about five years of my life on you, and I’ll text you shit like _I can’t believe you did this to me_ and whatever. And… I’ll probably be second guessing some of the feelings I had over the last bunch of years, and the way it felt like you felt about me? And the good parts of our relationship? Dammit, I actually might _be_ mad already.” 

“Rachel, you’re amazing, and the good parts of our relationship were really, really good. You were my best friend way before we ever dated and you’ve always been the most important person to me, even if- even if not in a romantic way.” 

The look in Rachel’s eyes was soft as she looked at him from across the picnic table. “Yes, but it _was_ in a romantic way for me. And honestly, I think I’d probably be madder if- well, if we were still dating. The fact that we haven’t been in a while helps. That there’s been some distance.” She took another bite of her pizza and chewed contemplatively. 

Well, it had basically been the same for him too, really. Who knew if he’d ever have had the guts to even walk into that gay bar if he hadn’t just broken up with Jessica, a woman he’d met at a party who he had no baggage with, and if he'd had Rachel there waiting for him afterward? Which reminded him- “wait, so how are you and Jason doing?”

“We’re doing okay- too early to know if it’s going anywhere, I don’t have a history with him like I do with you- but don’t change the subject. You told me you were _gay_ . Via _text_. And now you think you’re in love with this guy who you went on one date with yesterday.”

Patrick snorted, embarrassed. “I guess…? And look, I’m sorry. At least about the texting thing.” 

“No need to be sorry, I just wanted to make sure I understood this situation correctly.” Rachel took a massive bite of pizza and chewed and swallowed before she continued. “I’m going to allay all of the spiraling that may yet happen about the first part of this because I find the second part infinitely more interesting.”

“Well, that’s good, because god, Rachel, I’ve missed being able to get your advice about this stuff. You know me better than anyone else.” Rachel had always had a reputation among their friends as a straight talker, and Patrick had relied on it from her for years- except for that one elephant in the room, apparently. “And just to get two things straight, I wouldn't say I’m in _love_ with him exactly, and also I’d say more like a date and a half? We talked in the bar and it was kind of amazing.”

“And he also saved you from having sex with a creep, which I have to say, _very_ romantic.” Rachel was down to her crust and started gnawing away at the edges. “Was the creep hot, at least?”

Patrick nearly choked on a piece of pepper. “Rach!” he spluttered between hacking coughs. “What kind of a question is that?!” 

“It’s the kind of question I ask my friends when they have a near-sex experience at a bar,” Rachel replied, smirking. 

Patrick could feel himself going bright red. “I wasn’t actually going to have sex with him,” he muttered. “God. I stopped in at the bar after work, I was just looking around.”

Rachel looked a little shamefaced, but was still grinning. “You drove 45 minutes into downtown Toronto to go to this bar, that’s not just ‘stopping in after work.’ But- yeah, I’m sorry, that was probably a bit much. Honestly, I guess I’m a bit amped up from this whole situation? Still trying to figure out what our new… boundaries are, I guess. What’s normal now.”

“No, it’s- it’s fine. I know it’s weird. I mean, it’s weird for me and I’m the one who actually knew I was gay before an hour ago, I can’t imagine what it’s like for you.” She snorted and he smiled; some things hadn’t changed, it was still nice to diffuse tension with a laugh. “You can say what you want. And also-” Patrick hesitated. 

“Also?”

“Also…” Patrick took a deep breath and went for broke. “Also the guy I could-have-maybe-had-bad-sex with was hot. Definitely hot.”

There was a moment of shocked silence from Rachel before she whooped, a broad grin on her face. “Look at you _go_ !” she cheered, slapping him on the shoulder from across the table. “Flirting with hot guys!” The flaming blush Patrick felt across his face only deepened, but he could feel a small smirk making its way across his face too. “I knew you were a catch, dude. The girls see it _and_ the guys see it.” 

“Yeah but-” the thoughts were swirling around Patrick’s head in a dizzying cloud, but there was one point that should be made crystal clear. “But that guy was NOTHING compared to David. Like, I did not even know that someone that attractive could exist, let alone be sweet, and hilarious, and- and interested in me.” His voice choked on that last bit, because- well- that was the question, wasn’t it? _Was_ David interested in him? What did yesterday actually mean? 

“What does he look like?” Rachel asked eagerly. 

Patrick hesitated. He knew David’s full name now, and knew more than enough about him to Google him and find photos. David had _told_ him, detail by excruciating detail. But Patrick hadn’t wanted to actually take the plunge- partly, he told himself, to respect David’s privacy, but another bit of himself that he wasn’t sure he wanted to admit to pointed out that he didn’t really want to see David coked up in a paparazzi photo or draped over some bikini model or whatever. 

Patrick knew that if he already didn’t want to look David up himself, he definitely shouldn’t show Rachel a photo, but- he wanted to, so bad. Because if Rachel saw a photo, she would immediately understand what Patrick was talking about; see how drop-dead gorgeous he was, admire his long lines and his sharp fashion and his manicured stubble. 

If he didn’t show her a photo, he would have to _describe_ David, describe how he looked and how he made Patrick feel. And that just felt horrendously vulnerable. Even with Rachel, he wasn’t sure that was something he was ready for.

So he'd just split the difference. He sufficed with, “I don’t know if I should show you a picture, but- I don’t know, he’s just- there’s something about him. Tall, and dark, with these long legs, and the way he carries himself is just- you feel like he’s a panther in the jungle who’s going to pounce, but then he doesn’t pounce, he just kind of pets you, I guess, or lets you pet him? Not literally! I mean figuratively, like he’s just so nice, and he protects you, like Bagheera in The Jungle Book…” 

He trailed off when he saw Rachel’s expression, which gave him clear hints (if the rambling wasn’t enough) that perhaps splitting the difference hadn’t quite worked as intended. “Wow, The Jungle Book. I haven’t seen that in _years._ Didn’t we see that at Jamie’s seventh birthday sleepover?”

Patrick laughed, startled- he’d nearly forgotten that. “That was when you woke up in the middle of the night, got scared that you were in a different house, and woke up Jamie’s mother to call your mom to take you home, right?” 

“Okay, that only happened once,” Rachel said indignantly as they both chuckled, remembering. God. Things had seemed so much easier back then, when they were seven. Rachel grinned suddenly. “If this were a teen-girl sleepover, actually, I’d be saying something like- he sounds dreeeeamy,” she said with a teasing lilt, and Patrick blushed because… as ridiculous as that sounded, it kind of was true? It was like David had walked out of a fantasy that Patrick hadn’t even known that he’d had. 

“I don’t know, Rach, he was just- it’s hard to describe, but we had the best conversation even though we had nothing in common, and _then_ he decided we were done eating even though half our food hadn’t been eaten, and then he shut down in the car, and then he yelled at me to pull over and he fucking _kissed me-_ ”

“Just so you know- you know that’s the best part, right?” Rachel interjected. “There are so many people who would absolutely love a rom com moment like that. Like, he made you pull over so that he could kiss you. That’s incredible. Was it a good kiss?” 

Patrick wanted to say that he literally hadn’t known that kissing could be as good, and electrifying, and soothing, and satisfying as that kiss with David had been to the point that all of his other kisses had felt like pale imitations, but, like, maybe this wasn’t the right audience for a remark like that, no matter how understanding and enthusiastic Rachel was. So he just flushed brighter and muttered, “yes, it was amazing, of course. He’s also an amazing kisser.” 

Rachel waggled her eyebrows. “So, did you kiss with tongue? Because you know what they say, when he’s good with his tongue for kissing he’s usually good at other things too…”

And suddenly Patrick couldn’t take it anymore because he burst out, “yes, I know! He’s probably amazing at all that, just like he’s amazing in literally every other way! But it doesn’t matter, because I’m never going to see him again, because he completely shut down and gave me a whole list of reasons why I wasn’t getting a second date-”

“Yeah, you told me,” Rachel said, cutting him off. “Could you tell me exactly what happened? Like, what each of you said?”

“Sure,” Patrick answered, thrown, and he thought back and he told her. He could see her face changing as he went through the details, her eyes narrowing then widening then softening, her eyebrows bouncing up and down, her lips pursing- until he ended with, “so I kissed him- just a peck- and he got out of the car and didn’t even look back behind him, just walked straight into his building.”

There was a second before Rachel looked at him, smiling, and said, “just so you know, Patrick- you know you acted like an actual Disney prince, right?” 

No, Patrick did not know that. “No, I did not know that, Rachel, I didn’t, I know I tried my fucking hardest to get him to change his mind and say the right things while my heart was pounding out of my chest, and I must have done something wrong, because-”

“Because nothing, you did everything right. You told him you didn’t care if he was on _drugs_ , for heaven’s sake, you invited him for ice cream even though he made that into a whole thing, you _kissed him on the cheek_ \- John Green is going to write a novel about you one of these days. He’ll write a book about gay kids this time and you’ll be the manic pixie dream boy or whatever.”

“But, like, maybe I should care about the drugs! I don’t even know! And anyway David’s the manic pixie dream boy, not me,” Patrick muttered under his breath, because he'd never really had much of an opinion about those John Green books that Rachel had made him read when she was on her kick, but it was true, wasn’t it? Patrick was the boring kid who had no idea what he wanted with his life and David was unique and awesome and had changed everything for him in under 48 hours. 

Rachel sighed. “But he’s not, though, is he? Maybe David is the manic pixie dream boy in your story, but he isn’t one in his. It sounds like- it sounds like things are complicated for him, and while you did everything right just now, right now the thing you’re doing wrong is you’re making it all about you. It _isn’t._ ”

“What do you-”

“You put the ball in his court, and it’s going to stay there until he makes a decision, and that decision might not end up having anything to do with you at all. He’s got his own life and his own issues, and you have to learn to-” Rachel stopped suddenly, and her eyes widened and she seemed to be smiling? What was going on?

“Um, Rach? What exactly-” he began to ask carefully.

“You’ve never been rejected,” Rachel said slowly, smirking. “You’ve never been rejected, so you’ve never had this feeling before. I mean, I sure as hell never rejected you, and I don’t remember how it was with all your other girlfriends-”

“ _All_ my other girlfriends- there were like three, thanks-” Patrick interjected almost automatically.

“Your three other girlfriends, fine, you dumped all of them, and you didn’t really pursue anyone- you just haven’t been rejected or dumped before and it’s freaking you out.” 

Patrick opened his mouth to argue but found that he couldn’t, because fuck, that was probably true, wasn’t it? 

“Look,” Rachel said as though talking to one of her preschool students, “if he turns you down, you are going to suck it up as a new experience and live with it. Being rejected is part of life.”

 _But this MATTERS to me_ ran through Patrick’s mind, but somehow saying that to Rachel, for whom it had mattered every time he’d broken up with her, seemed misjudged. 

“I know I’m overreacting and being stupid. I know it’s normal to be rejected-”

“You haven’t even _been_ rejected yet!” Rachel said exasperatedly.

Patrick groaned. “I know! It’s just that- that- I really liked him, okay, and if he doesn’t text me back I’ll never _know_.”

“Never know what?”

“Anything! I’ll never know why he said no, I’ll never know what he actually thought of me, I’ll never know if I was good enough-”

“Because I said, it’s not about you, it’s about him!” Rachel wasn’t a shouter, she was what she called a “loud insistor” if anything, and she was loudly insisting now, her voice at a freakishly high volume for her. Patrick shut up immediately. “Look, if he says no, or if he ghosts you, you are welcome to come and moan about it to me afterward. Just remember that whatever he does, it’s not about you. It sounds like he’s dealing with a dysfunctional family and shitty friends and a _lot_ of past rejection, and this probably has a lot higher stakes to him than it does to you. He doesn’t owe you anything and he’s going to make his own decisions that work for him and you are going to have to live with that.”

Patrick was about to express his extreme doubt that David had been rejected often when suddenly he remembered that surprised tone when David had said, “you want to go out on a date with me?” It had felt like surprise that someone like Patrick would ask someone like David out, but maybe that wasn’t it, exactly. He remembered back in the bar, when David had seemed shocked, almost flummoxed, when Patrick had bought him a drink. Patrick remembered thinking that it seemed like David hadn’t had anyone buy him a drink in a while, which had been such a weird and unlikely thought that he then hadn’t stopped to think about whether maybe it was actually the truth. 

He remembered David brazenly listing off every single reason why Patrick should get far away from him and then asking him point-blank, a funny look in his eyes, if Patrick still wanted to take him out for ice cream. And god, Patrick was the world’s biggest asshole. 

“So you’re saying,” he said, a small smile beginning to form his face, “that David is more like that girl who goes to the weird town in New York, not the guy with cancer.” 

After a beat of confusion Rachel burst out laughing. “Yeah,” she responded, “basically. God, I knew I made you read those but I didn’t think you actually _retained_ anything.” 

“I didn’t know I had either, honestly, they really weren’t that great.” Rachel mock-glared at him, and he laughed again. “So basically I’m turning this into too big a deal, this isn’t about me, I need to chill the fuck out?”

“Essentially yes,” Rachel answered, her face going serious again. “But- part of chilling the fuck out is also not beating yourself up? I told you, you did everything right so far as I can tell, and if he turns you down then you’ll get back out there and sometime soon you’ll be really great for someone else. David isn’t the only attractive guy who’s going to be interested in you.”

And as logical and reasonable as Rachel has been, as much as she’s got to be right about all this stuff she’s saying and as much as it’s really sweet of her, actually, to keep telling him how awesome he is after he’d dumped her three different times… he doesn’t really want to hear it. He doesn’t _want_ to hear that David’s not the only guy out there and someone else will be right for him. Maybe it’s true, but admitting it feels not just like giving up, but like giving up on something special, something rare and valuable that he’ll never find again if he makes the choice to let it go. 

**

Ten and a half hours later, after he’d remade his bed, grilled 11 pieces of chicken and stored them in a Tupperware for later in the week, done a Costco run, done an actual run, had a phone conversation with his parents in which he said literally nothing that was on his mind, eaten one of the pieces of grilled chicken with some steamed broccoli for dinner, and watched a bunch of episodes of Orange Is The New Black, which was pretty good, Patrick suddenly felt a buzzing vibration next to him on the couch. An entire afternoon of carefully avoiding thinking about that phone buzzing flew out the window- Patrick immediately paused the episode he was watching and snatched up his phone frantically. 

**David Rose** had texted him _are you around tomorrow for ice cream._ It took a minute for Patrick to fully register the text, but when it finally got through, Patrick did something that he couldn’t remember doing since he was a kid excited about winning Little League. 

He jumped up in the air and he _whooped._

**

The next afternoon at 1:00 PM found him ducking out of work to make the 50 minute drive to the address David had texted him, some ice cream shop on the waterfront, for the time David had specified in his extremely terse text. David probably had no concept of normal working hours, or maybe he was leaving Toronto tonight, and either way Patrick didn’t give a shit as long as he got to spend some time with David eating fancy ice cream. 

From the outside, the ice cream shop looked like the kind of place that was expensively decorated to look rustic and probably charged $5 for a vanilla scoop in a cup. Patrick made a mental note to check the price list once inside, but he pushed the door open his attention was completely turned to the man sitting at a back table, staring at his phone. 

David looked amazing as always, in a black short sleeve button down with white stars around the collar and what looked like silky black shorts. His hair was perfectly styled, his eyebrows were imposing, but he also seemed- tired, really. His eyes were drooping shut and he was leaned forward against the table like it was holding him up by the elbows. And there was a twitchiness that made Patrick remember everything that David had said about drugs. 

As Patrick walked in, David looked up from his phone, and he smiled from the side of his mouth in a way that Patrick would swear was instinctual because it was very nearly tamped down almost immediately. His eyes were smiling, though, but also filled with something that Patrick quickly realized was nerves. 

David was _nervous_ for this date. 

For a second Patrick couldn’t believe that someone like David would be nervous to be meeting someone like him. But that was what Rachel was saying, right? He had to stop assuming it was all about him, he had to- he had to stop putting David on a pedestal and start paying attention to him as a person. And that person was nervous, yet still happy to see him. 

Patrick was about to open his mouth to say hi when David stood up and said abruptly, “see what you want- I’m paying- the Cacao Semifreddo is really good.” Dumbfounded, Patrick watched David go up to the counter and order a scoop of the Cacao Semifreddo and a scoop of something called Banana Creme Brulee in a waffle cone. What he received from the store attendant was something that looked suspiciously like a chocolate-banana ice cream cone, topped with sprinkles. David nodded at it, satisfied, and began to lick at it, which Patrick immediately turned away from because he didn’t know exactly where they stood yet and so he did not currently have license to watch _David Rose lick an ice cream cone_. 

Patrick looked up at the signboard and discovered that his instinct was indeed correct; a scoop of Vanilla Bean was $5.99. Well, if he wasn’t paying… Patrick ordered himself a sundae with scoops of Caramelized Walnut, Peanut Butter Ripple and Cacao Semifreddo, because David said it was good, all topped with fudge sauce. 

The Cacao Semifreddo was indeed good, but it was basically just chocolate ice cream. 

As Patrick tasted his ice cream, David paid with a credit card that was as deep black as a fancy sports car and turned to Patrick, saying, “let’s go.” He strode out the front door, ice cream cone in hand, and began to walk across the street to the waterfront park; Patrick had to nearly run to keep up. By the time Patrick arrived, David was already sitting on a bench facing the water. Patrick sat down next to him, because supposedly they were on a date, right?

David took a long slurp from his cone as Patrick wildly wondered whether maybe this was a dismissal with courtesy consolation ice cream and maybe he was supposed to go away now, when suddenly David turned in his direction and said, “I’m sorry.” 

Patrick froze, his spoon next to his mouth. He took the bite of Caramelized Walnut and fudge sauce and swallowed before he felt equipped to ask, “what for?” Was David sorry for leading him on? Because that would certainly suck. 

“I’m sorry if I made our dinner on Saturday awkward.” David said. “I’m sorry if you felt uncomfortable afterward. I never wanted that. I wanted you to have a nice time and enjoy it.” 

Patrick didn’t know what to say. This wasn’t a brush off, but it wasn’t _not_ a brush off. He went with, “I did have a nice time.” 

David gave that little half-smile from before again, so different than the confident flirty grins from their date (Patrick had noticed that David hadn’t called it a date and _really_ hoped that didn’t mean anything) that had swept Patrick off his feet. These felt more- grounded, more real, if more hesitant. “I’m glad,” David responded, quietly.

There were the sounds of more ice-cream eating from next to him as Patrick stared at the water, moving spoon to mouth almost mechanically. He could barely have told anyone what the Peanut Butter Ripple tasted like. He didn’t know what to say.

Until, maybe, he did. “So I’ve been thinking about it, and I think that you’re right but you’re also stupid.”

“ _Excuse me_?” The sounds of slurping completely stopped from next to him and he turned to see David gaping at him. He looked offended but not quite angry, like he was waiting to hear what Patrick had to say, which was a good sign at least. 

“You’re right but you’re stupid. You’re right that maybe you’re not the most… intuitive person for me to date right now. You don’t live in Toronto, your lifestyle is very different than mine, and I’ll be honest, the whole drug thing maybe does alarm me a little bit more than I implied it did two nights ago, but that’s mostly because I just don’t know much about it. There are a lot of reasons why this wouldn’t make sense on paper. But you’re stupid if you think that’s going to stop me from trying to get to know you better because meeting you is one of the best things that has happened to me in a very long time and I’d be the stupid one if I let you get away.”

David’s mouth dropped open as Patrick said all this, and he stayed silent for a few seconds after Patrick finished, as though processing, only to break into a “fuck!” as he felt a drip of Cacao Semifreddo trickle down his wrist. Watching him frantically reach for a napkin to wipe it, realize they didn’t have any, and then give up and lick at his wrist and the cone in order to stop the leak should have made Patrick laugh, but he was feeling too on edge to do more than smile weakly as his heart pounded. 

When David looked somewhat settled, back on the preemptive-edge-slurping stage to prevent further calamities, Patrick said hurriedly, “that said, I don’t actually think you’re stupid. I shouldn’t have put it that way. From the way you talk I’d say you’re one of the smartest people I’ve ever met. It’s just-”

“No, yeah, I know what you mean, I think,” David said quickly, abandoning the leaking ship of his ice cream cone for a second to look at Patrick. “I mean- damn, I shouldn’t have gotten food that requires so much _concentration_ to eat,” he said, frustrated, as a few more drips of his scoop spilled down his cone. “I mean, at least I’m wearing short sleeves, but this is going to get on my pants eventually and they’re from a boutique in Rio that’s only open during Carnival-”

At least here Patrick knew what to do- years of instincts from being a gentlemen on dates with girls kicked in as he sprang up and ran back into the ice cream store. He emerged a surprisingly short amount of time later with an extra bowl and spoon courtesy of a surprisingly obliging and fashion-conscious server. 

“He said that he feels bad, he should have said something when he saw your shirt was couture,” Patrick said, grinning, as David eagerly dropped his cone into the bowl and began cracking the cone into pieces. 

David snorted. “I would have thought that he’d have a- what do you call it, duty of care? It was negligence to let me order this monstrosity.” Patrick was still grinning like an idiot and thanking the server for not stopping David from ordering that cone because now all that tension from when they’d first sat down was just evaporated, like it had been nothing. Everything that Patrick had felt on their previous two meetings- the zing, the feeling of knowing exactly what to say to David and feeling like he knew what David would respond- it was all back like it had never been gone. 

Go Cacao Semifreddo!

Cone suitably smashed and scattered on the ice cream, David looked up and said, more somberly, “yeah, well, do you still think- all that that you just said? Like, this wasn’t a big deal thanks to your _extremely_ fast thinking, but if it had dropped? You would have been dealing with a full blown freakout and it would have been ugly and I would have felt bad about it afterward but I have these kind of visceral reactions when my clothes get stained.”

“Well, then, I’ll just have to continue to use my lightning-quick instincts in the future, won’t I,” Patrick responded reasonably. “Your clothes are expensive, you care about how you look- you’re allowed to be upset if they get dirty.” 

David’s mouth opened and shut and opened again. “I guess,” he said slowly. “I mean- obviously, yes. But it doesn’t actually seem to work like that, does it.”

“I mean, if someone spilled something on my stamp collection, I’d be really furious, and the whole thing can’t be worth more than a couple hundred bucks, except for that one my grandparents got me for my high school graduation that’s in the bank,” Patrick continued, because it was hilarious and adorable how David’s eyes widened the second Patrick mentioned “stamp collection.”

“Oh my god, I can’t believe you’re one of those people,” David said disbelievingly. “You collect stamps when no normal person has sent a letter in five years. What even is the point?” 

“Okay, so first of all stamp collecting isn’t about actual mail, it’s about having pieces of art and history from countries around the world,” Patrick retorted, all light inside. “Secondly, I’ll have you know that I send a Mother’s Day card to my grandma every single year, not to mention the themed family photo Christmas cards my parents send out to an ever increasing list of people. They actually buy themed stamps for those. Like with little Santa Clauses or snowflakes.” 

David groaned. “You’re from one of _those_ families, fuck, where everyone wears their little Santa hats and Christmas sweaters and goes to Sears for the photo, right? I can’t believe this.” 

“Actually, we take the photo in our living room in front of the tree- which goes up the first week in December, by the way- and my dad puts his camera on a tripod and sets the timer. Also,” Patrick reminisced, “when I was a kid, my parents would be Santa and Mrs Claus and I was an elf, actually? I had this green elf suit and little elf hat? Now we all wear reindeer antlers, though. And my dad tells us to say ‘Merry Christmas’ for the camera.”

“OH my GOD,” David said in delighted disgust. “I cannot believe that your family suffers from such a kitschy lack of taste, but also now I want to see a photo of you as a baby elf.” 

“I’ll just have to put you on their Christmas list twenty years ago, then,” Patrick shot back, and David rolled his eyes. Patrick could have said, _oh, actually, I have copies of all our Christmas cards back at my apartment and I’m happy to bring one to our next date,_ but he’s pretty sure they’re not there yet. He doesn’t quite know where they are, but they’re… heading somewhere, he thinks.

“I can’t really see myself ending up on your parents’ Christmas list- I mean, you’re closeted, right?” David asked, almost nonchalantly, as though he knew the answer.

Patrick started at the abrupt change of topic, and had a feeling that maybe this was something that David had been looking for an opening to ask. He was about to instinctively say yes, but that wasn’t quite true, was it. “I- I told someone.” As David turned to him curiously, one bushy eyebrow raised, he said quickly, “my ex- I mean, my best friend. I told my best friend. Who happens to be my ex.” 

“Your best friend who happens to be your ex.” David appeared to think about that one for a second or two, only to shake his head decisively. “Nah, can’t see it. How can you possibly stay friends, let alone best friends, with someone you slept with? I was best friends with this publicist and our friendship couldn’t even survive us having the same dealer.” 

One of these days Patrick was going to get used to all this kind of stuff David said so nonchalantly, but today was not going to be that day. “Well, I guess we’ll see how it goes. This is all pretty new.” 

“You mean- you’re best friends now that you’ve told her, and you weren’t before.”

“Well, not exactly,” Patrick said uneasily. “We were best friends as kids way before we dated, but yeah, us being best friends- and just friends- again is as of yesterday afternoon. She said that she may think about it and be more mad at me later on for all of those years wasted and feeling lied to and all that, but for now- she was just so great-” 

“Oh, I didn’t realize you guys talked yesterday. I thought maybe she was the one who styled you for our date- you looked very dashing,” David said with a smile that made Patrick flush.

“Um, thanks,” he responded, “all me, I’m afraid.” 

He could see David open his mouth to say something, then think better of it and take a spoonful of ice cream instead. His lips around the spoon were- inspiring, honestly, almost as much as his tongue had been on that cone. This was probably a good time to stay quiet and just watch, maybe eat some of the ice cream sludge that had melted to a puddle at the bottom of his own bowl-

But he opened his big mouth anyway, as though compelled. “She kind of talked me around, because I was all in my head about whether you were going to text me back,” Patrick admitted in a rush. “I was freaking out, you know? Going crazy. And she told me to get the fuck over myself.”

His spoon halfway to his mouth, David froze. “Okay…?” he said, cautiously. “What were you freaking out about? Did I make you freak out?” His voice went higher pitched and nervous as he talked. 

“I was freaking out because I wanted you to say yes and I thought you might say no,” Patrick answered, because that had been it, hadn’t it? All of Patrick’s elaborately constructed concerns, just him being afraid that the boy he liked didn’t like him back? “And she said if you said no it was your choice and I couldn’t do anything about it and either way you hadn’t actually said no yet so why invite trouble.” 

David smiled. “Well, that sounds like pretty good advice, not inviting trouble,” he said, and Patrick felt lighter.

“I know that I said before about how I’d be stupid if I let you get away,” he said quickly, “and it’s true, I would be, but it really is up to you, and whatever you decide I’ll be okay with. I just- I really want you to say yes and go out with me again, that’s all.” 

No matter how much more confident their banter earlier and David’s reluctant half-smiles had made him, there was still something nerve-wracking about putting himself out there like this. He realized that he’d been nervously fiddling with his spoon, stirring at his ice cream in the bowl, and took a spoonful. 

“Ugh, I do not recommend cement-mixing ice cream,” he said with a grimace. 

David laughed. “I don’t see why the consistency matters, it’s chocolate.” He glanced down into Patrick’s bowl. “Wow, you barely ate any of that.”

“What can I say, I was distracted by you eating yours, I guess.”

Patrick smiled as an adorable flush crept over David’s face; he could see David working to suppress a smug grin that had showed itself in a flash. “Um, okay? I mean, I’m not sure what to say to that.”

“You can say, thank you, and I’d love to go on another date with you the next time I’m in Toronto,” Patrick prompted, heart in his throat. “If that’s something you want.”

David sat still for a second, and then turned so that he was entirely facing Patrick, looking him right in the eye. “Thank you,” he said, a glint in his eyes. “I’d love to go on another date with you the next time I’m in Toronto.” 

Patrick could sense the hesitance, but he could also sense the smile in David’s voice and that made him smile in turn. “I’d love to go on another date with you the next time you’re in Toronto, too!” he said. “How did you know?”

“Oh, a little birdie told me, with a surprising amount of emotional intelligence and awareness that I have to tell you in advance I’m completely incapable of,” David answered.

“I can’t say I’m super great at it myself, but Rachel used all her kindergarten-teacher magic to squeeze it all out of me, I guess.” 

David slumped back in his seat again. “Rachel is the best-friend ex? I wish I had one of those. Someone to help me get my head out of my ass.” 

There was another moment of silence as Patrick contemplated the puddle in his bowl, realizing that he couldn’t remember eating more than five spoonfuls of his ice cream. Then David spoke. “The thing is,” he said slowly, “I have a flight back to New York tonight? And I don’t really know when I’m coming back, exactly. I probably will soon, I just don’t know.”

Compared to all of Patrick’s catastrophizations from earlier, this felt like nothing. David had said that he wanted to go on another date; that was the important bit. This was just a tiny speedbump, was all. “Well, you have my number, or at least you have Sonic the Hedgehog’s.” He gestured at his shirt, and while he wished he could say that he specifically chose a blue shirt for today as a nod to the joke, the only way he could have _avoided_ wearing a blue shirt was if he’d worn that weird pinstripe one that was always itchy around the shoulders. 

David smirked at the shirt and then reddened for some reason. “You’re- you’re actually not Sonic the Hedgehog. In my phone. Anymore.” He seemed like he was avoiding Patrick’s eyes for some reason. 

Well. “Well, that’s good, you’ll know who I am no matter what I’m wearing,” Patrick joked, and David laughed. 

Then David’s phone buzzed, and he looked at it and cursed. “Shit,” he muttered, “my flight is leaving at six, not eight, and apparently I’m flying commercial? So I have to go if I want to pack and make it to the airport in time.”

Patrick had thought that they’d get a bit more time- he’d taken the afternoon, just in case it went well, and it had gone well, but everything was over way too soon. He got up and stretched his legs, tossing eighteen dollars of melted ice cream in a nearby trash bin. “Well then, I won’t keep you. I should probably head back too.” 

David got up too, his carefully scraped-clean ice cream bowl following Patrick’s into the trash. “I live two blocks away, and I need the walk, so I’m just going to do that, if that’s okay,” he said in a rush.

Patrick stilled, wondering if this was a brush off, but then David leaned down, carefully, and pressed his lips delicately against Patrick’s, and their last kiss had been sitting down so there hadn’t been much of a height difference and so this should have been strange but instead it was dizzying, David’s lips on his, David’s hands on Patrick’s shoulders for a quick blink-and-miss-it second. Patrick could feel himself blinking dazedly as David pulled away with a quirk of his lips and said softly, “I’ll text you, I promise.”

This time as David walked away he looked back once or twice, and from the corner before he turned onto another block he actually turned all the way around to look at Patrick, who was pretty sure he hadn’t moved a muscle since that heartbreaker of a kiss and was probably staring back like an idiot. Then he walked swiftly away, and Patrick felt his whole body relax.

There was a lot that they hadn’t said, he knew. He’d meant to ask something about the drugs, to ask about what it meant about David being maybe-famous, to find out what exactly David wanted out of all of this. But he had another date. That was what mattered. 

Smiling like he didn’t know how to stop, Patrick walked his way back to his car.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so... I have to admit, I kind of don't like writing Patrick's POV? It just doesn't come nearly as naturally to me as David's and so after staring at this for weeks I was just like, okay, I've had enough, let's just shove this out into the world. I do want to keep the alternating POV style in the future though so hopefully it gets better. 
> 
> As far as Rachel- I wanted to include canon characters because I don't love OCs, and initially I really hesitated about including her because I sometimes feel like fic has her getting over everything Patrick does really quickly and that never sat right with me, but then I was like, this is precanon, I'm able to invent circumstances where it works, so why not? Hopefully it does work!
> 
> Also, I have been to Toronto exactly once and after staring at Google Maps for five minutes and trying to figure out where stuff is I gave up so just imagine that the geography here makes sense. 
> 
> Please let me know what you think in the comments and don't forget to wear a mask and save lives!


End file.
